If you're in the mood for a dandy, double-crossing, duplicitous little
crime caper, this is your ticket. Edward Burns stars as a cocky, well-dressed
grifter named Jake Vig who's almost as clever as he thinks he is. "Playing the
big con is like putting on a play where everyone knows their parts except for
the mark," Jake explains.

Problem is: when Jake and his cohorts (Paul Giamatti, Brian Van Holt,
Louis Lombardi) do a quick hustle for $150,000 when they arrive in Los Angeles,
they accidentally arouse the ire of the King (Dustin Hoffman) a sleazy local
mobster. For payback, Jake agrees to pull a $5 million embezzlement scam on a
banker (Robert Forster), using an unsuspecting loan-officer as their mark. To
this end, he recruits a sexy pickpocket (Rachel Weisz) but, to complicate
matters, the undercover cops (Donal Logue, Luiz Guzman) on Jake's payroll are
now being trailed by a suspicious federal agent (Andy Garcia). And everyone's
working an angle!

While screenwriter Doug Jung, cinematographer Juan Ruiz Anchia and
director James Foley ("Fear," "Glengarry Glen Ross") are heavily indebted to
Quentin Tarantino's "Pulp Fiction," they pull off enough twists and turns to
keep the timeline narrative tantalizing. Edward Burns assumes a bland Ben
Affleck-persona, which isn't all bad, while Rachel Weisz oozes oomph and
grizzled Andy Garcia is almost unrecognizable. But the big surprise is Dustin
Hoffman's creepy, idiosyncratic pervert. Grinning maniacally as he cracks gum
with his green-tinged teeth, he defines repugnant. On the Granger Movie Gauge of
1 to 10, "Confidence" is a slick, stylized, snazzy 7. Why is it that a
well-crafted con can be so satisfying?